Eight senior Libya military officers defect to rebels

The defecting Libyan generals do their own version of Da Vinci's 'The Last Supper' for the camera's in Rome.

Eight senior Libyan military officers – including five generals – have defected from Colonel Muammar Gaddafi’s army and joined the rebels.

At a news conference in Rome the men appealed to fellow soldiers in Gaddafi’s army to join them and back the rebels.

One of the generals’ named as On Ali On, read an appeal to fellow soldiers and security officials to abandon the regime “in the name of the martyrs who have fallen in the defence of freedom”.

He also denounced both “genocide” and “violence against women in various Libyan cities”.

Another general, Melud Massoud Halasa, said that Colonel Gaddafi’s forces were “only 20 percent as effective” as they were before the rebellion, as “not more than 10” generals remained loyal to him.

Former Libyan Foreign Minister Abdel Rahman Shalgam, who now backs the rebels and appeared at the news conference, said a total of 120 soldiers had defected in recent days.

Meanwhile, South African President Jacob Zuma rode in to Tripoli and had tea with Colonel Gaddafi in the hope of finding a non-violent solution to the civil war.

Even if President Zuma is not succesful, it now seems only a matter of time before Gaddafi falls. His ever decreasing circle of loyal ministers and generals is starting to take on more of the look of the last days in Hitlers bunker.

If a loyalist does not pull the trigger on him, then a NATO missile will find him. Exile does not seem to be a viable option anymore. Either way western governments will not want to see Gaddafi go on trial. He knows too many secrets for them to allow that to happen.